Hackaday’s portal gun actually levitates a companion cube

I was out to lunch with a couple friends, brainstorming ideas for fun projects when one of them says “Wouldn’t it be cool if we could build a working gravity gun?”. We all immediately concurred that while it would in fact be cool, it is also a silly proposition. However, only a few seconds later, I realized we could do a display piece that emulated this concept very easily. Floating magnetic globes have been around for quite some time.

I determined I would tear the guts out of a stock floating globe and mount it on a portal gun, since they’re easier to find than a gravity gun. I would also build a custom companion cube to be the correct size and weight necessary.

The Levitation System

I started off with a StellaNova magnetic levitating globe. I chose the larger version that is roughly 8″. My assumption was that this one would be able to hold a little more weight than the smaller version.

Prying the coil out of the metal frame turned out to be difficult and actually resulted in a damaged coil that I had to repair. If you were to replicate this, I’d suggest cutting the entire metal case that contains the coil from the frame instead of trying to remove just the coil.

Once I had the coil out, I tore the strong magnet out of the top of the globe. This globe actually has a magnet in the base that helps stabilize it during levitation so I knew I was going to have to tweak my companion cube to get the weight just right. As you can see, my process is purely scientific and extremely precise.

The portal gun

I really wanted to make my own portal gun for this. My schedule and my ego fought hard on this subject and ultimately my schedule won. While I feel like I could have built a fantastic portal gun, there’s no way I could have done it in a reasonable amount of time and gotten as nice of results as just buying the portal gun props available at toy stores.

When initially mounted the coil on the gun, I found that the “arms” were far too flexible. I had to reinforce the arm somehow. The option I chose was simply to bend a piece of steel to the correct shape and strap it to the underside of the “arm”.

I made a cardboard model to test weight and size of the companion cube and got the system working on the portal gun.

The Cube

At this point, the entire thing is working. I’m far too excited to wait for some kind of store bought cube to arrive and attempt to get it to the correct weight. That’s assuming I could find one the right size. So, I made my own out of foam. Admittedly, it isn’t the best looking companion cube in the world. If I were to take this further, I’d probably sculpt one and make a mold so that I could make my own solid foam companion cube.

A single huge improvement:

I started off thinking that the final product would be a portal gun that you could hold while it levitated a cube. This meant that I needed to actually mount the coil that suspends the floating cube on to the portal gun. As you can see in the video, it is a fairly visible modification. You can see the coil, wires, and reinforcement on the top arm of the portal gun. Once it was built however, I found that I couldn’t hold it still enough to maintain the levitation.

Since holding it is officially not going to happen, I realized I could have done this in a more aesthetically pleasing manner. Instead of using the type of floating globe that dangles the magnet below a coil, I could have used one with a magnetic base that floats the magnet above the coil. This would have left the portal gun completely un-modified.

Thanks

I wanted to give a special thanks to Vintage Stock in Springfield Missouri (the one on Glenstone), who let me bring the system in and show it off until the hall effect sensor finally got smashed too many times and the cube wouldn’t levitate.

Different Stokes for different folks, but with this at the top pf the page I about moved on
“Especially since about half of the pages haven’t been updated over ten years and half the links are broken.

Well, bookmark this site anyway, as I plan to update it as soon as I can find some free time.”
Not the most enticing way to inspire new visitors however I scrolled through the opening page anyway, still nothing to compel me to explore much further. For most hackman implies we would see the projects of hackman or others front & center on the opening page, but one has to scroll ro the bottom to get to an index where we can select areas of interest
I compare that the hacakaday, where I week can go by, and quickly catch up on the posts by tapping the sown arrow key. A side bar allows me to catch up on posts of particular topic interests quicker yet. I did bookmark bookman, but I can’t see myself visiting it regularly.

How about, instead of using that weighty and obtrusive coil, using three small but powerful standard magnets at the same polarity pointing towards the ‘hold area’ of the gun attached to each arm, and the cube made of a magnetic metal/contains a magnetic metal/contains another strong magnet. The cube would then be physically pushed inside the claws, perhaps making movement more possible.

Actually, it WOULD work. Leafy, you clearly do not understand the forces involved yourself. In fact, it is VERY easy to make it work with the right size magnets. A maglev train essentially uses this layout of magnets. You have a magnetic “deadzone” at the center of the region of magnetic force. The object (the companion cube) thus “floats” in the center of the three magnetic fields. There maybe some slight fluctuations due to the occasional cancelling of two or more magnetic fields, but it is only slight and only very short-lived. It is similar to the effect of moving air on an object. Ever turned a vacuum cleaner hose straight up and suspended a ball in the stream of air? That is the same result you would get with three magnets arranged around a point.

“I had to reinforce the arm somehow. The option I chose was simply to bend a piece of steel to the correct shape and strap it to the underside of the arm. — Jeri Ellsworth (see above)

Every time she talks like that, my heart goes pitter patter. To really make my day, maybe she’ll get back to putting a roll cage into a race car, measuring, bending, cutting, welding… Ah, wait a second, I’m singing a Journey song here (“Lovin, Touchin, Squeezin”)!

I have to stop, the room here is getting too warm.

(I’m not hassling Jeri here, quite the reverse. I have a great deal of respect for her. Here she succeeded at a magnetic suspension project, and I know how hard it is to stabilize those, because I tried to do the same thing, and didn’t get it stable before I ran out of time.)

Shouldn’t step 2 be modify( hack) them, with step 3 being combine them? In regards to step one; show us a hacker that claims they never purcased anything off the shelf to get started on an idea, sorry respectfully we may have been lied to. That leaves step 4:Profit?; I certainly hope so, or at the very least not costing those who run Hackaday to the point they have to reconsider if there efforts are the best course of action for themselvess & their families. Both hHuge, and hack are relative terms , subject to personal opinion. Here’s mine All hacks are “builds” Build has distinct long time definition, so it isn’t a relative term. This build is constructed from items that have been hacked. INMO a hack? Yes. A huge hack? No. Not that I don’t appreciate the effort.

I just wanted to leave a comment for you guys to possibly consider. This would be a much more in-depth project and would require a lot of research time and money but, it would be unfathomably cool if you could combine your idea with this: http://www.ted.com/talks/boaz_almog_levitates_a_superconductor.html It’s a magnet that in unison with a semiconductor uses “quantum locking” to “levitate” the semi-conductor. It would be super cool if you guys could do that!

the mini replica gun has been sitting on my shelf, collecting dust… after seeing this hack, ive decided to give it a whirl (also bought a smaller globe for only $10, same brand). what tools did you use to take the coil out of the globe stand? if you can please give me some tips that would be great since i tend to have the patience of an wildebeast, my globe would probably break in a matter of minutes and subsequently have me yelling fus roh dah at the top of my lungs like a crazed madman….

Aha! Seeing a recent reply from the builder, thought i would jump in with a question of my own. How much does the globe weigh??? Ive got the same base that i got from a goodwill outlet store (if youve never been to one, you dont know what youre missing. Broken things and parts galore) and ive been trying to weight a plastic penguin with a magnet in his dome and make him float but i cant seem to get it anywhere near correct. Did you reuse any of the electronics from the stellanova base or just the coil? Great job on this one btw.

Would be cool if all three prongs had mcu controlled magnet coils that could hold a better grip on a metal companion cube — also if there was a coil in the center, so that you could quickly create a magnetic push which would toss the cube out (like in the game) — or help in attracting one (for instance, from the table).